


Stones and Birds

by quigonejinn



Category: House of Cards, Marvel (Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-20
Updated: 2013-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-29 21:40:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/691753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quigonejinn/pseuds/quigonejinn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>" -- mutual appreciation society." </i>  Marvel Cinematic Universe fusion with <i>House of Cards</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stones and Birds

**Author's Note:**

> This is premised on (and contains hideously enormous spoilers for) the British TV version of the series and the US TV version. It also mucks with the time line for the series pretty heavily in order to make it stick with the MCU. 
> 
> All the good ideas are, as usual, from destronomics.

13.

"Sign here, here, and here." 

"You don't say please, do you?" 

"The time for that ended in May a year or so back, Mr. President." He can't tell whether she's smiling or not even though they're looking each other directly in the face. Her mouth isn't turned up in a smile; he can't see any teeth, and her eyes aren't smiling, but there is something in her -- 

The South Lawn stretches in the background through the windows, and the President is very rarely alone in the Oval Office, especially when he has been in office only two months and some days He has his Chief of Staff with him and one of the Chief of Staff's deputies, too; he has secretaries outside the door and the Secret Service, too. 

"Metaphorically speaking, of course," she says, still sounding like she might smiling at him. "Nobody comes back from the dead." 

After a metaphorical pause where they're still looking each other in the face, and she is actually smiling this time, he signs. She surprises him by asking for the pen. He looks at her for another moment, still taking in the ways in which her face looks the same, but also looks different, and then, he hands the pen to her, and she puts it into her pocket. 

Coulson likes memorabilia. He'd like having the pen that was used to autho -- 

12.

"What are you asking me to sign?" 

"Given that I've got you on video, does it matter?" 

"Video?"

Stamper looks horrified; Stamper's immediate boss looks a combination of angry and confused. 

11.

Stamper is not, of course, the Chief of Staff: too many connections to the old days, too much attention spent on background. Frank Underwood is capable of loyalty when it would be useful; he sees value where it can be found. He knows, too, the use of a weak chief of staff as long as there is hard stuff elsewhere in the command structure. So he has the Chief of Staff make Stamper one of two deputies. It gives cover for everyone, and Stamper is in the room, so he puts the clues together and realizes it a bare half-second after Underwood does. The face, the half-dimple, the way of smiling. She hadn't been a redhead, and the clothes are different. A cardigan in a dark color over a conservative blouse, a knee-length skirt, a staff pass that says -- 

The Secret Service did not want the President to have his own smartphone, but settled for controlling a terminal-based clone that shows every message the President gets. Two months and eight days into office, a message shows up with an attachment: a coroner's report of a young girl's body, found by one of the weekend janitors taking trash out to the dumpster. Fallen from a great height. ID on the body indicates that she was -- 

10.

Stamper realizes it at almost the same moment that Underwood does. Underwood just moves faster. Underwood just happens to be closer: the face, the half-dimple. She hadn't been a redhead, but it doesn't matter. The face is close, and for a second, she plays along. She trembles. She tries to pull away. In a scared-sounding voice half an octave higher than her normal speaking voice, "Mr. President, you're _hurting_ me." 

At the same time, though, a hand closes around Mr. President's left wrist, squeezing brutally hard, and between one breath and the next, before Frank can lunge for the silent alarm, he finds that his knees have gone out and his arm is twisted up behind him. 

"I'd sit back down, John, and toss that panic button onto the floor unless you want me to do something permanent with your boss," she says in an entirely different voice, without looking up, and the Chief of Staff sits back down, shakily, into his chair. He has, after all, just seen the President of the United States grab a female staffer by the arm and shove her up against the wall and --

John tosses his keys with the panic button onto the floor: Stamper, not being stupid, doesn't need to be told. He holds very still and keeps both hands in sight. 

Natasha looks back down at Underwood. 

"Can I let you up, Francis, or are you going to do something stupid?" 

The Secret Service did not want the President to have his own smartphone, but settled for controlling a terminal-based clone that shows every message the President gets. One month and twenty-two days in office, and a number not loaded into the contacts sends a text directly to the private number: _call me. it's been a while._

Since it isn't on the pre-approved list, the Secret Service runs it back to base: an inactive number, last held by Zoe Barnes, a reporter for slugline.com, now deceased. The telephone company says that it looks like the President had been in contact with her before the number-change; the message had somehow been in limbo for almost a year and a half, but got released in a routine server update. It wouldn't happen again. There weren't any other messages in the queue; it wouldn't happen again. 

Just a technical glitch, isn't it? He probably didn't even notice, right? . 

9.

A meeting appears on the President's private Blackberry and the Secret Service clone. It doesn't show on any of the schedules assembled by his secretaries; none of them remember putting it on the President's private schedule. March 16, 2009, 12:15 am, 9th and L, NW. _one year anniversary. happy father's day._ The meeting is scheduled for 15 minutes. Nobody brings it to the President's attention because it's just a technical glitch, isn't it? Gibberish thrown up in the tech transition. POTUS probably didn't even notice. 

8.

Here is what happens on March 16, 2008: Frank Underwood is on the roof of a building. A young woman that he has been sleeping with on-and-off, off-and-on confronts him. She has brown hair, big eyes, and evidence that he murdered Peter Russo to further his own political ambitions. He gets out of her the fact that she didn't do anything as clever as leave the evidence with a friend along with instructions to forward to the Herald if she didn't return. 

She helpfully wanders a little too close to the edge, and he throws her off the building. He feels it's like a long time afterwards before he hears a crunching noise. Then, he looks over: a body on top of a dumpster. He and Stamper debate about whether to plant a suicide note or make it look like she was drinking, but in the end, they decide against it: they'll just leave it at that. Zoe Barnes, not entirely stable. Zoe Barnes, angry at the world, full of conspiracy theories. 

Frank Underwood never notices the camera. Thanks to his own weakness and the angling away of the building, Frank Underwood doesn't see substitution of -- 

7.

"Right shoulder, eleven o'clock."

"I see him."

They're standing in the door that leads to the stairs that lead to the apartment that Natasha is living in as Zoe Barnes. "You should kiss me," Natasha says. "I'll push you away, and you can act like your feelings are hurt." 

Barton looks at her, hides a smile, and kisses her. She pushes him away, gently, and he steps back into the shadows. 

6.

Coulson will stay on the audio as long as he needs to, but out of a sense of decency, he tries not to look at the laptop screen: the long line of Natasha's bare legs with Underwood crouched at the end of the bed. The apartment is wired for sound and video: for a brief moment, before she hangs up and since he has a piece in each ear, Coulson hears Natasha moan in stereo. Phone in the left ear, apartment mike in the right. Video shows it in multiple angles the left, the right, above. Natasha loops a leg over Underwood's shoulders. Underwood lays his face against against her thigh and puts two fingers inside her, and using movements that look like desperation, Natasha hits _end call_ on the phone, just before she arches halfway off the bed. 

Underwood slides his fingers out of, slick and shining. He says that she isn't allowed to come yet, and Natasha turns her face away. In his left ear, Coulson hears her beg, sort of breathlessly. With his eyes, he can see her on the camera. Her face flickers and he sees, for a moment, for a second, her -- 

In the kitchen, a spider that is not a black widow struggles inside a wine glass. 

5\. 

"Does the age difference bother you?"

A slow, sweet smile. "No." 

4\. 

Natasha and Coulson are reviewing footage because SHIELD wants to put a bug on both on every phone that Underwood has. _Total surveillance envelope_ , SHIELD calls it. _Basic competence_ , Natasha calls it. In either case, this includes the separate phone that he uses for -- 

"You've got plenty of footage of the work phone," Natasha says. "It's the other one that's the problem, right?"

"Right." 

Natasha likes Phil Coulson. She likes him: this level of competence and professionalism rarely travel together, so she sits down next to him on the bed. It's the only sitting surface available, because they're in her apartment and the couch is covered in clean laundry. Phil has, on his knees, the laptop with all the surveillance footage from her apartment, which is thoroughly and properly wired. Again, competence. Professionalism. 

"So try last Wednesday, around 11:45 or so." 

Coulson walks the footage back. A long, long period of silence follows. Natasha leans back on an elbow. They are, after all, on the bed. Natasha is wearing a zip-up hoodie, and she likes Coulson a lot, but not quite enough to keep the amusement out of her voice. It's good for him. 

"He wanted me to get creative." 

3\. 

" -- mutual appreciation society." 

2\. 

A room. A meeting between Nick Fury and the harassed head of SHIELD's legal division. 

"Defense will never sign off on any of it. You'll need an executive order just to defrost the guy. I don't even know what you're going to need to assemble the rest of them. Honestly, Fury, you'd need sign-off from so many executive agencies and so many departments, never mind where you even get the money for this."

A pause. A beat. A silence that may or may not rhetorical.

"So what you're telling me is," Natasha Romanov says, leaning back in her chair. "SHIELD needs a sitting president." 

1\. 

Two years later, Natasha puts the President of the United States on his knees inside the Oval Office. She presents him with some paperwork, and once he has signed, she takes up the pen that he uses to sign the secret executive order authorizing SHIELD to take all necessary steps to implement the Avengers Initiative. 

Two birds, one stone -- Natasha Romanov approves of efficiency. Phil Coulson likes memorabilia, and when she gives him the pen, he points out that it's actually like three birds and one stone. They're taking care of old business, too, though they didn't know until much later. 

After all, who helped Obadiah Stane arrange for the initial Jericho demonstration to happen in Afghanistan?


End file.
